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Venice: THR Chief Film Critic’s Top 6 Most Anticipated Titles

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Venice: THR Chief Film Critic’s Top 6 Most Anticipated Titles

Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson in the film ‘The Banshees of Inisherin.’

Courtesy of Venice Film Festival/Searchlight Pictures

The rugged Aran Islands off Ireland’s West coast were evocative settings for two lauded Martin McDonagh plays, The Cripple of Inishmaan and The Lieutenant of Inishmore. But the intended third part of that trilogy was never produced or published; the playwright expressed doubts about its merits and stated a desire to return to it when he was older. His new film — about the lifelong friendship of two men, abruptly severed with dark consequences — represents the rebirth of that long-gestating project, reuniting McDonagh’s In Bruges stars, Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell. 


Bardo, False Chronicles of a Handful of Truths
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Courtesy of Venice Film Festival/Netflix

Alejandro González Iñárritu’s first Mexican feature since his 2000 breakout, Amores Perros, has been precipitously dubbed by some observers as his Roma, referring to the childhood memoir of his colleague, Alfonso Cuarón. But this epic comedy chronicles the return home of a famed journalist and documentarian, with family relationships, questions of cultural identity and changes to the country of his birth sparking an existential crisis. The protagonist is played by the great Mexican actor Daniel Giménez-Cacho, seen in Lucrecia Martel’s Zama and Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s Memoria


Taylor Russell and Timothée Chalamet in Bones and All

Courtesy of MGM

Luca Guadagnino reteams with his Call Me by Your Name lead, Timothée Chalamet, starring opposite Waves discovery Taylor Russell in an adaptation of Camille DeAngelis’ novel of first love between two drifters on the road whose odyssey leads them back to confront their terrifying past. Much advance talk has focused on the book’s cannibalism elements, and the teaser contains moments of both lyricism and horror. David Kajganich, who wrote Guadagnino’s A Bigger Splash and Suspiria, penned the script; the deluxe supporting cast includes Mark Rylance, Michael Stuhlbarg and Chloë Sevigny.  


The Eternal Daughter
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Courtesy of SANDRO KOPP/A24

Following her critically adored two-part remembrance of things past, The Souvenir, idiosyncratic British filmmaker Joanna Hogg returns to fiction with this ghost story about parental relationships, in which an artist and her elderly mother confront long-buried secrets in their former family home, now a hotel haunted by memories and mysteries. Tilda Swinton heads the cast in what’s being described as “a towering, deeply moving performance.” 


Cate Blanchett stars as Lydia Tar in TAR.

Courtesy of Florian Hoffmeister/Focus Features

Todd Field’s In the Bedroom and Little Children were searing psychological dramas that revealed a multitalented actor-turned-director able to coax shattering work from his casts. His first feature in 16 years is set in the international world of classical music and stars Cate Blanchett as Lydia Tár, the first female conductor of a major German orchestra, widely considered among the greatest living composer-conductors. (The protagonist is fictional, but appears to be inspired by Eva Brunelli, the first woman to conduct the Berlin Philharmoniker.) Supporting cast includes Nina Hoss, Noémie Merlant, Mark Strong and Julian Glover, while the original score is by Hildur Guðnadóttir, an Oscar winner for Joker.


Brendan Fraser in The Whale
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Courtesy of Venice Film Festival/A24

Darren Aronofsky directs MacArthur “genius” grant recipient Samuel D. Hunter’s adaptation of his profoundly affecting 2012 play about empathy, despair and redemption, centered on a teacher weighing more than 500 pounds, who’s unable to leave his shabby Idaho apartment, and the unanswered questions about the death of his male partner. Brendan Fraser plays the protagonist, in what many are hoping will be a major rediscovery for this beloved but too long undervalued actor, starring opposite Stranger Things regular Sadie Sink as the estranged teenage daughter with whom he struggles to reconnect. The cast also includes Hong Chau and Samantha Morton. 

This story first appeared in the Aug. 17 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.

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Review: SAMARITAN, A Sly Stallone Superhero Stumble

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Review: SAMARITAN, A Sly Stallone Superhero Stumble

Hitting the three-quarter-century mark usually means a retirement home, a nursing facility, or if you’re lucky to be blessed with relatively good health and savings to match, living in a gated community in Arizona or Florida.

For Sylvester Stallone, however, it means something else entirely: starring in the first superhero-centered film of his decades-long career in the much-delayed Samaritan. Unfortunately for Stallone and the audience on the other side of the screen, the derivative, turgid, forgettable results won’t get mentioned in a career retrospective, let alone among the ever-expanding list of must-see entries in a genre already well past its peak.

For Stallone, however, it’s better late than never when it involves the superhero genre. Maybe in getting a taste of the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe) with his walk-on role in the Guardians of the Galaxy sequel several years ago, Stallone thought anything Marvel can do, I can do even better (or just as good in the nebulous definition of the word).

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The property Stallone and his team found for him, Samaritan, a little-known graphic novel released by a small, almost negligible, publisher, certainly takes advantage of Stallone’s brute-force physicality and his often underrated talent for near-monosyllabic brooding (e.g., the Rambo series), but too often gives him to little do or say as the lone super-powered survivor, the so-called “Samaritan” of the title, of a lifelong rivalry with his brother, “Nemesis.” Two brothers entered a fire-ravaged building and while both were presumed dead, one brother did survive (Stallone’s Joe Smith, a garbageman by day, an appliance repairman by night).

In the Granite City of screenwriter Bragi F. Schut (Escape Room, Season of the Witch), the United States, and presumably the rest of the world, teeters on economic and political collapse, with a recession spiraling into a depression, steady gigs difficult, if not impossible, to obtain, and the city’s neighborhoods rocked by crime and violence. No one’s safe, not even 13-year-old Sam (Javon Walker), Joe’s neighbor.

When he’s not dodging bullies connected to a gang, he’s falling under the undue influence of Cyrus (Pilou Asbæk), a low-rent gang leader with an outsized ego and the conviction that he and only he can take on Nemesis’s mantle and along with that mantle, a hammer “forged in hate,” to orchestrate a Bane-like plan to plunge the city into chaos and become a wealthy power-broker in the process.

Schut’s woefully underwritten script takes a clumsy, haphazard approach to world-building, relying on a two-minute animated sequence to open Samaritan while a naive, worshipful Sam narrates Samaritan and Nemesis’s supposedly tragic, Cain and Abel-inspired backstory. Schut and director Julius Avery (Overlord) clumsily attempt to contrast Sam’s childish belief in messiah-like, superheroic saviors stepping in to save humanity from itself and its own worst excesses, but following that path leads to authoritarianism and fascism (ideas better, more thoroughly explored in Watchmen and The Boys).

While Sam continues to think otherwise, Stallone’s superhero, 25 years past his last, fatal encounter with his presumably deceased brother, obviously believes superheroes are the problem and not the solution (a somewhat reasonable position), but as Samaritan tracks Joe and Sam’s friendship, Sam giving Joe the son he never had, Joe giving Sam the father he lost to street violence well before the film’s opening scene, it gets closer and closer to embracing, if not outright endorsing Sam’s power fantasies, right through a literally and figuratively explosive ending. Might, as always, wins regardless of how righteous or justified the underlying action.

It’s what superhero audiences want, apparently, and what Samaritan uncritically delivers via a woefully under-rendered finale involving not just unconvincing CGI fire effects, but a videogame cut-scene quality Stallone in a late-film flashback sequence that’s meant to be subversively revelatory, but will instead lead to unintentional laughter for anyone who’s managed to sit the entirety of Samaritan’s one-hour and 40-minute running time.

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Samaritan is now streaming worldwide on Prime Video.

Samaritan

Cast
  • Sylvester Stallone
  • Javon ‘Wanna’ Walton
  • Pilou Asbæk

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Matt Shakman Is In Talks To Direct ‘Fantastic Four’

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According to a new report, Wandavision’s Matt Shakman is in talks to direct the upcoming MCU project, Fantastic Four. Marvel Studios has been very hush-hush regarding Fantastic Four to the point where no official announcements have been made other than the film’s release date. No casting news or literally anything other than rumors has been released regarding the project. We know that Fantastic Four is slated for release on November 8th, 2024, and will be a part of Marvel’s Phase 6. There are also rumors that the cast of the new Fantastic Four will be announced at the D23 Expo on September 9th.

Fantastic Four is still over two years from release, and we assume we will hear more news about the project in the coming months. However, the idea of the Fantastic Four has already been introduced into the MCU. John Krasinski played Reed Richards aka Mr. Fantastic in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. The cameo was a huge deal for fans who have been waiting a long time for the Fantastic Four to enter the MCU. When Disney acquired Twenty Century Fox in 2019 we assumed that the Fox Marvel characters would eventually make their way into the MCU. It’s been 3 years and we already have had an X-Men and Fantastic Four cameo – even if they were from another universe.

Deadline is reporting that Wandavision’s Matt Shakman is in talks to direct Fantastic Four. Shakman served as the director for Wandavision and has had an extensive career. He directed two episodes of Game of Thrones and an episode of The Boys, and he had a long stint on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. There is nothing official yet, but Deadline’s sources say that Shakman is currently in talks for the job and things are headed in the right direction.

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To be honest, I was a bit more excited when Jon Watts was set to direct. I’m sure Shakman is a good director, but Watts proved he could handle a tentpole superhero film with Spider-Man: Homecoming. Wandavision was good, but Watts’ style would have been perfect for Fantastic Four. The film is probably one of the most anticipated films in Marvel’s upcoming slate films and they need to find the best person they can to direct. Is that Matt Shakman? It could be, but whoever takes the job must realize that Marvel has a lot riding on this movie. The other Fantastic Four films were awful and fans deserve better. Hopefully, Marvel knocks it out of the park as they usually do. You can see for yourself when Fantastic Four hits theaters on November 8th, 2024.

Film Synopsis: One of Marvel’s most iconic families makes it to the big screen: the Fantastic Four.

Source: Deadline

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Dan Aykroyd, Chevy Chase Star in ‘Zombie Town’ Mystery Teen Romancer (Exclusive)

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Dan Aykroyd and Chevy Chase have entered Zombie Town, a mystery teen romancer based on author R.L. Stine’s book of the same name.

The indie, now shooting in Ontario, also stars Henry Czerny and co-teen leads Marlon Kazadi and Madi Monroe. The ensemble cast includes Scott Thompson and Bruce McCulloch of the Canadian comedy show Kids in the Hall.

Canadian animator Peter Lepeniotis will direct Zombie Town. Stine’s kid’s book sees a quiet town upended when 12-year-old Mike and his friend, Karen, see a horror movie called Zombie Town and unexpectedly see the title characters leap off the screen and chase them through the theater.

Zombie Town will premiere in U.S. theaters before streaming on Hulu and then ABC Australia in 2023.

“We are delighted to bring the pages of R.L. Stine’s Zombie Town to the screen and equally thrilled to be working with such an exceptional cast and crew on this production. A three-time Nickelodeon Kids Choice Award winner with book sales of over $500 million, R.L. Stine has a phenomenal track record of crafting stories that engage and entertain audiences,” John Gillespie, Trimuse Entertainment founder and executive producer, said in a statement.

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Executive producers are Trimuse Entertainment, Toonz Media Group, Lookout Entertainment, Viva Pictures and Sons of Anarchy actor Kim Coates.  

Paco Alvarez and Mark Holdom of Trimuse negotiated the deal to acquire the rights to Stine’s Zombie Town book.

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